Monsters Among Us: Chapter 6

WIth the book in his hand, he didn't read it that day. It was too late and he was tired, so he went to sleep, and in the morning he had a job to do.

They were still grinding down the number of obelisks, and even after they would finish them, they would have more work to do. This whole project if left to a normal sized crew would have taken years, but with it being supercharged with so many people, it would take half a year.

Safe to say, that he was stuck with this particular job for the foreseeable future, especially when it gave such a generous salary. And if he became better at magic and had applicable skills with, then even more money.

"What are you reading there kiddo?" Gretta was walking beside the carriage, he was seated beside Vincent, an offer the foreman proposed when he saw him trying to read while walking. He was very thankful for that.

"A book about how to wield magic, trying to get better at this." He knocked on the cover. "It is hard when there is no one to ask questions to though."

He didn't mention that with his doubling of thought processing, he could read at twice the speed. He would finish the thick tome in a week if he read it every single moment of the day. One problem he had was that his eyes could barely keep up with the speeds he needed them to be on.

Another problem that was slowly starting to disturb him was how hungry he got and the increased intake of food he needed. Whatever the doubling did, it also made it so his brain required more energy.

Case in point, the satchel filled with dried fruits tied to his waist. Though it wasn't an inconvenience now, it was going to get concerning as he upgraded it further.

"Self-taught?" Gretta's voice pushed him out of his thoughts. He nodded. "Bit difficult that, why aren't you going to university then?"

"It's complicated." Alexios grouched and got back to read.

He had finished the introductory chapters and got the first chapter. Contrary to what he expected, it was about mana sight and how to make it turn inwards.

'The mind's eye is widely believed to be situated on the forehead, artistic depictions paint it as a vertical eye with no lashes and or a faintly demonic alien structure. All of these are false, your mind's eye is primarily an extension of your mana self, what people describe as the soul. It is not tethered to any single point in the body, but your whole body acts as the eye. In this case, we refer to it as mana sense, and if you can detach yourself from the image of the eye and transform your belief into it being an omni-direction sense, then you can see both the outward and the inward worlds.'

"Fuck my arse." He groaned at the bloated text.

"Happily." Gretta quipped, which made him glare at her. The other crew laughed and he gave them weaker glares, that made them only laugh harder.

He returned to his book and tried to tap into what the archmage was trying to teach.

Opening his mind's eye, he gave the world around him an appreciative glance. Vincent beside him had an overwhelming amount of voices, a better descriptor would be an unorganised mess that hadn't been cleaned up in decades.

He tried to glean information from it, but the maelstrom was too maddening even for his enhanced self to comprehend. Mayhaps he should try looking at children, to see if they had less of a storm inside of them, perhaps life experience is what makes people so hard to read? A theory that he would need to confirm.

Turning away from the people around him, he tried to turn his vision inwards. That was harder than he expected because it was like seeing the mana world from a single point in space and not from his body.

A full three hundred and sixty degrees of vision and yet he couldn't turn it back around to look at itself.

Trying different methods didn't work, changing his position in the real world didn't work. A whole different set of tests confirmed that there was something in the central position of his body. But he couldn't get a beed on it.

Finally, he gave up when Vincent shook him to do his job. He could read the rest of the book, practise other stuff then get back to it later.

'Do not read further or practise other techniques until you master inner sight.'

Right. Of course. Great.

He smashed his face agaisn't the cover and groaned into it.

A whole week passed with no progress. No matter what he tried, it just didn't work. Thinking fast didn't mean thinking good, and that fact floored him.

He was a bit under two weeks from the next doubling, and one week till Song would test him. That time seemed long enough when he shook her hand, now it was increasingly feeling like it was too short.

It was a monday and he was walking back with Steve. He had to stick to him unless he wanted to smash into a wall from not paying attention.

"Ok, I am tired of this." Steve bumped into his shoulder and knocked him out of his train of thought. "What's got your panties in a twist?"

"You won't understand, it's about mana and magic." Alexios replied.

"Try me." Steve replied with the confidence of a man who had nothing to lose and everything to gain. Alexios only directly a dead stare and conceded the staring contest.

"My mana sight is pointed outwards, and I am trying to make it look inwards. " He explained before he got to the problem. "Nothing's working, doesn't help that all I've got to go on is a book and no one to explain it to me."

"You trying to look at yourself?" Nod. "A mirror."

"What did you say?" Alexios asked, bewildered.

"If you want to get a look at yourself, try a mirror." Steve smiled at his flabbergasted expression. "You've been trying to fix the problem with mana, maybe a normal thing will work."

"That…might actually work." Mana conformed to reality, its purpose and function was a reflection of reality. That was his current understanding, so, a mirror's mana would have the purposes of reflection, perhaps illusionary duplication? Would that transform itself to an ersatz version of his body, a lesser mimication?

It was a very solid lead amid desperate attempts. The problem was that he didn't have a mirror. He knew someone who did.

"I know that look." Steve laughed and patted his shoulder. "Come on, I am heading over to her house."

"Thank you, sorry for disturbing your time with her." He will repay it back, in time.

"We weren't going to do anything…" Steve winked at him. "Naughty anyways."

Chuckling, he broke off at the next intersection and arrived home. With all the money he had accumulated, he spent a not insignificant sum buying extra food for his enhanced appetite and for other miscellaneous expenses.

The majority of his salary went to purchasing logs for the eventual renovation of his home. His mom had trepidations about her home being messed around with, he assured her that it wouldn't take long and that when the renovations were happening he would get her a room in a fancy inn for the duration of it all.

His uncle only grutted in pride at him, and told Alex that he will be staying in the slaughterhouse.

A light meal later and saying goodbye to his mother, he left his house and went towards Steve's house. The sun was dipping in the horizon, so he carried with him a lantern in case he took too long.

Steve was just closing his door when he spotted him.

"Ready?" Alexios said. Seeing Steve nod, he started to walk. "Lead the way."

The path they took was headed to the innards of the city. With the night coming closer, they started seeing drunkards on the roads and the occasional Dreamer sprawled across the floor. That became less and less as the amount of guard patrols increased.

They weren't given too much attention by anyone, just two dudes heading out to a tavern or a brothel.

Bismark's home, surprisingly, was at the edge of the outer city. This was still inside his neighbourhood, and he had visited it several times when he was a child. Her home hugged the wall that separated the two areas.

It was a three story home, marked with age and oddly dishevelled for a building this close to the inner area. There was a holder for a brass knocker on the door, but it seemed to have fallen off. Steve just banged the thick wooden door with his fist.

"Who's there?" The fair voice of the girl sounded out over them. Said girl was leaning over her window and staring right at them through the dark. "Oh, Steve and Alexios. Give me a minute."

"She lives alone?" Aled said after she disappeared.

"Her parents died in the plague." Steve's morose voice, Alexios shook his head to get rid of the images of rot. "Had a small fortune left in her inheritance, not enough to live in the inner city, however it was sufficient to live a frugal life in the outer city."

"You've got yourself a winner Steve." He slapped his friend's back. "She is beautiful and rich."

The door opened and Bismark smiled at them. She gestured for them to come in and led them to the guest room. It was dusty, so they had to wipe with a rag.

Alexios sat on an empty one seater and left the couch to the couple.

"I have something to ask, a small request." Alexios said.

"He needs the bronze mirror I gifted you for a short moment." At her qustioning glance, he explained. "It is a mana sight thing, he is being frustrating with all the furious thinking he is doing."

"My pleasure." She smirked at Alexios and got up to head upstairs.

"I was frustrating?" Alexios wondered.

"You emenated the energy." His friend dared to act like he was a wide sage with his hand on his chin and half lidded eyes. "I could feel your frustration through the mysterious energies that tie together our fate."

"Shut up, you don't sense mana." The quip in Steve's nouth got halted as Bismark came down with a circular bronze mirror in her hands.

Alex stood up and took the mirror from her hands. Steve also came up to his feet.

"Here you go. Steve gave it to me for my birthday, it was a very considerate gift." Bismark smiled at her lover.

"Everything for you." Steve was lovestruck, and Alexios was too excited to feel uncomfortable.

"Alright, here we go." He felt his friend and the girl both looking over his shoulder as he concentrated on delving to the mana realm.

The world exploded into liveliness, voices played across his various senses telling him of the tapestry of existence that surrounded him.

Steve was a tornado of purposes, his mana attuned to nothing and all he got from him was gibberish.

Bismark was more subdued, yet her purpose seemed to be encrypted. It wasn't like the structured and controlled encryption of lady Song. It seemed more instinctive and natural. He would have to ask her what that was about.

Turning his vision to the mirror in his hand, he felt his expectations matched and surpassed. The mana's purpose was that of reflection, mimicry, window, portal and disillusionment?

He watched as the mana of the bronze mirror changed to show him a bright ball of HIM amid a normal person's storm of mana.

Suddenly, he felt his vision warped and saw it expand to include his whole body with the addition of the bright ball that was his mana self.

Satisfied and ready to come out of mana sight to celebrate, he took a peek at his friend and Steve's girlfriend and what he saw made him freeze.

Bismark…

She was madness, she was destruction, she was death and life.

She was Swarm, and it was hungry.